The Cruelest Animal
by Alex Foster
Summary: Because he has to know, John asks Cameron a question.


Title: The Cruelest Animal

Author: Alex Foster

Category: General

Rating: PG

Summary: Because he has to know, John asks Cameron a question.

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by Fox. No money is being made and no infringement is intended.

Author's Notes: I don't normally write fanfiction for fandoms only a few weeks old, but I just had to contribute something for this great show. Hope you all enjoy.

* * *

_Knowledge is power._

Sir Francis Bacon, Meditationes Sacræ. De Hæresibus. (1597)

* * *

It took John two days to figure out how to ask her the question. 

He tried phrasing the question in a way that wouldn't offend her, until of course he realized machines could not feel offense. In his mind he imagined Sarah's patient voice telling him again that terminators aren't real people, just soulless things.

Deciding whether he wanted to know the answer to the question filled the second day. There was something...twisted in even wondering such a thing about his protector. Again it was Sarah's voice that answered him. There was no useless knowledge. Knowing was a weapon that might save a life one day. It might save the world one day.

It was that mindset that drove him when he was under ten years old to learn how to field strip an AK-47 assault rifle in less than two minutes. While other kids ran to their parents to show a new finger painting, he ran to Sarah to show her how he disassembled the clip retention bolt.

This continued during his years in foster care. Often alone, John made it a point to continually expand his knowledge of how to survive. He became a good scavenger and thief. Even learning how to work computers and machines despite being their mortal enemy.

The only thing that stopped him was the realization that his loner teen rebellion against his foster homes just might turn him into the person in the future his mom, the machines sent back, and his real father all thought existed in him. John did not want to turn into that person. He never did. Not someone that could send his own family back in time to die. To fight a grizzly guerrilla war that led to the deaths of the people around him. No, that was not the John he wanted to grow into.

Still, John found himself slipping from the house several hours before dawn with his mind made up. He had to know just in case. He's mother's training was too complete to not know. Pulling the hood of his sweatshirt up, he started moving down the darkened streets at a light jog.

Cameron was behind him, matching his pace, before he even left the block. Escaping the house was not for her benefit but his mother's. For reasons he could not identify, John didn't want his mother knowing what he was about to ask.

Feeling tight muscles ease as he relaxed into the run, John began moving faster. His sneakers splashed through puddles from last night's rain as he turned down one empty alley after another. Without showing any sign of exertion, Cameron continued to shadow him. Of course she wouldn't tire, he reminded himself. He had seen terminators keep pace with speeding cars. They were just machines.

Enjoying the rush of warm blood to skin exposed to the chilly and damp air, John slowed and turned back. He couldn't go too far because he wanted to be back at the house before his mother woke. This was between John Connor and a machine.

"Pretty good," he said as Cameron jogged up beside him. He was breathing heavy but hers was still slow and regular.

"Thank you." She smiled and for a moment he could believe it genuine.

He concentrated on the ground pounding underfoot for a long moment. "I need to ask you something," he finally said.

"I know."

"You do?"

"Running is not part of your daily exercise regimen. In the future you often do this," she said. "Draw one away from the group so that you can talk to them privately. Strenuous activity is also often involved."

John came to a stop in the middle of the empty street and leaned down with his palms flat against his thighs, catching his breath. "Really?"

"Yes." Cameron stopped and regarded him with a slight head tip. Large brown eyes blinked at him. "This is how you gave me the mission to go back and protect your younger self."

He was both intrigued and unnerved that she knew him that well. More questions, ones that he was sure she wouldn't answer, sprang to mind. Exactly where did this different terminator fit into future John's rebellion? Was she a true soldier or just another weapon propped in the corner waiting for a task? Worse, John wasn't sure which alternative he would prefer.

"What did you wish to know?"

Foolishly feeling as if she handed him a blank check to ask whatever he wanted about the future, John quickly weighted the original question again. "I need," he said and hesitated. "I need to know how to terminate you."

A look of surprise actually registered on her small pretty face. "Why would you wish to end me?" Something painfully akin to grief filled her voice and John felt like he had just broken a machine's heart.

"Not that I think I'll have to," he quickly said. "Just in case you go evil or something. Or if Skynet sends another of your model back to fool us."

Cameron seemed to consider this for a moment. "That could not happen. My mission is to protect you, John Connor. I could never harm you."

Something in her voice made him feel even worse. "But I think I need to know, just in case. You must have a weak spot or something."

"EMP hyper bomb set at point-three-oh-oh will terminate me if set off within a range of fifty yards," she intoned. "Synetic laser set at zero zero eight will cut through my--"

"No," he cut her off just a little louder than necessary. "How do _I_ stop you?"

Cameron suddenly stepped in close and grabbed his hand. Before he could pull back she raised his hand to her face, tipped her head to meet his palm, and guided his fingers through her hair. Her skin was warm and soft which seemed both incorrect and perfectly right at the same time. She gave off waves of body heat that he was acutely aware of standing only inches apart. Her hair was soft and smelled of herbal shampoo that he dumbly wondered why she had to use. He'd seen her bend solid steel but her hand was small and delicate holding his.

"One and two quarter inches from my left temple is a maintenance port in my skeleton," she said softly, almost, he thought, intimately. Was this foreplay for a machine? "If I'm held down, a drill should penetrate the access door quickly and destroy my central operating unit. It will terminate me instantly."

Very conscious of how close they were, and that she still rested her head in his hand, John swallowed hard and inched away. "Um, thanks." Remembering that she could sense his blood pressure and heart rate through touch, he pulled his hand back. "Doubt I'll ever, um, have to but it's good to know. Thank you."

"You're welcome." Those large eyes blinked at him again and John wished he could read something, anything, in them. "Future John knows how to destroy me, so you should as well."

They walked back to the house in silence as the sky started to brighten. Sarah's voice reminded him that Cameron wasn't a real girl and that he was right to learn how to stop her. There was no safety. There were no friends. Survival was all that mattered. Images of himself in a possible future floated along side that voice now armed with new knowledge to use against the machines.

Still, John wondered walking home with one of them at his shoulder, if they were nothing but soulless things why Cameron wasn't looking him in the eye...and why he was secretly glad.

**End**


End file.
